Congress

Issue: House Committee Passes Genocide Declaration.

October 18, 2007

By any reasonable person's definition, what the Ottoman Empire practiced during World War I against its Armenian minority was genocide. The nations of the world have long acknowledged the ruthless massacre in the second decade of the 20th Century, a century marked by widespread massacres on numerous continents.

Now, the U.S. House Foreign Relations Committee has voted to officially declare the 1915 attack as genocide. The resolution gratifies the Armenian-American community, which has justifiably sought such a designation for decades. Well-meaning as it may be, however, the resolution would deeply offend Turkey, one of America's strongest allies in the Middle East.

Fortunately, a number of House members are rethinking their original positions in favor of the measure, possibly forcing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to table it.

Proponents of the resolution rightly believe that the way to prevent future holocausts is to acknowledge and condemn those that have occurred in the past. Nonetheless, the unfortunate fact is that this country is currently embroiled in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The cooperation of Turkey is essential for the logistics of prosecuting those wars.

U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Delray Beach, a member of the House Foreign Relations Committee, has taken the pragmatic step of voting against the measure, a position supported by the White House, to the dismay of many of his constituents. He has chosen to focus on the broader picture of our nation's present needs, rather than the narrow issue of redressing the inhumanities of a near-century ago, however worthy that goal might be.

A better way to make a meaningful statement is for Americans to dedicate their efforts to heading off and mitigating unfolding humanitarian disasters, like those in Darfur and Myanmar.

Yes, the world must know how the Armenian people suffered. The best way to honor them, however, is to prevent more massacres, and to do so in their name.